This invention relates generally to processing within a computing environment, and more particularly to methods and system for debugging a cache memory.
A cache is a memory component that improves processor performance by transparently storing data such that future requests for that data can be served faster. The data that is stored within a cache might be values that have been computed earlier or might be duplicates of original values that are stored elsewhere. If requested data is contained in the cache (cache hit), this request can be served by simply reading the cache, which is comparably faster. Otherwise (cache miss), the data has to be recomputed or fetched from its original storage location, which is comparably slower. Hence, the more requests can be served from the cache the better the overall system performance.
To debug certain problems or set up certain special test cases for the cache, it is desirable to be able to write data into the cache or read data out of the cache either before the system is running or after the system is running.